One of the passages used to illustrate the NT use of the OT in Three Views on the New Testament Use of the Old Testament was Galatians 3 concerning Paul’s use of the word “seed.” I was especially interested in this passage because I remember being quite impressed with N. T. Wright’s treatment of it in The Climax of the Covenant a few years ago. In this post, I would like to do three things: 1) summarize each author’s understanding of this passage; 2) bring N. T. Wright into the conversation and explain, in broad strokes, his exegesis; and 3) ask which of the three views best reflects N. T. Wright’s approach.

Since Peter Enns chose the “seed” passage as one of his examples and elaborated on it in his essay, we get a fuller picture of Enns’ approach related to this particular issue. Kaiser and Bock merely responded to Enns so there will be some inevitable reading between the lines. But since I am only interested in the approach and not a full exegesis of the text, I believe each position can be fairly outlined (at least I will attempt to do that).
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Berding, Kenneth, Stanley N. Gundry and Jonathan Lunde, eds. Three Views on the New Testament Use of the Old Testament. Grand Rapids, Michigan: Zondervan, 2007.

Issues surrounding the NT use of the OT have been of great interest to me for a long time, so it was with equally great delight that I read yet another contribution to this complicated and yet fascinating field of study.

The structure of Three Views on the New Testament Use of the Old Testament is very simple. It contains an introduction, closing remarks by one of the editors and three essays followed by a response by the two other opposing views. Although the length of the essays were adequate, I wish more space had been given for the responses.

The three views represented are:

Walter Kaiser – Single Meaning, Unified Referents
Darrell Bock – Single Meaning, Multiple Contexts and Referents
Peter Enns – Fuller Meaning, Single Goal

The task of each author was to answer the following questions:

• Is sensus plenior an appropriate way of explaining the NT use of the OT?
• How is typology best understood?
• Do the NT writers take into account the context of the passages they cite?
• Does the NT writers’ use of Jewish exegetical methods explain the NT use of the OT?
• Are we able to replicate the exegetical and hermeneutical approaches to the OT that we find in the writings of the NT?

It would be pointless to reproduce the arguments of each author here since this is a complex subject and there is no way I can do justice to their views. But I would like to make some general observations and share some personal impressions of the different positions and the book.
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